Sapphire Radeon RX 7900 XT 20GB Review – The cheaper variant isn’t the worst!

RDNA3 has been on the market for quite some time and besides AMD’s reference cards, you usually only see reviews of the RX 7900XTX and usually only of the more expensive custom models. The RX 7900 XT currently plays a kind of shadowy existence, especially the somewhat cheaper models of the respective board partners. That was reason enough for me to test the Sapphire RX 7900 XT Pulse, which is currently just under the 900 euro mark at around 895 euros and about 250 euros cheaper than its sister model, the Sapphire RX 7900 XTX Pulse.

Well, the card is about 20 percentage points slower than the XTX, but it also costs almost 30 percent less. So it is a fair story, especially since it can usually beat the GeForce RTX 4070 Ti of about the same price in the grid performance and the sum of all my tested games. Except for the thing with the socket, but I’ll get to that later.

But what I can already spoil: Sapphire generously gave us this card to raffle in the community. With which, if you win, you will receive a card assembled by myself, which certainly won’t hurt the long-term durability (pads, thermal paste). The conditions of participation can be found at the end of the article. So please read everything, what awaits you there beautiful and not just as always pre-scroll!

The Sapphire Radeon RX 7900 XT Pulse 20 GB

The card has 84 CUs and 20 GBytes of GDDR6. Everything is connected to a 320-bit interface. This means that the card has a maximum bandwidth of 800 GB/s. However, AMD also specifies an “effective” bandwidth of 2.9 TB/s for the RX 7900XT. This number is related to 96 MB and 80 MB of Infinity Cache located in the six MCD chips. We have to reckon with 315 watts of power consumption for the smaller card and our test model was also only just above this limit.

The card looks a bit smaller, more graceful and unagitated than the Nitro models, even though the proportions are of course correct. With a length of 31.5 cm from the outer edge of the slot bezel to the opposite end of the cooler cover, the card is already a bit longer. The height of the inserted card turns out rather normal with the measured 12.7 cm from the upper edge of the PCIe slot to the upper edge of the cooler cover. The installation depth of 5 cm plus 0.5 cm for the backplate is within the scope of a decent 2.5 slot design.

On the top, we primarily see the two 8-pin sockets for the external power supply. We don’t have to discuss the bending radii for the power supply connections at AMD this time either, everything is still oldschool. The red Radeon lettering is not missing this time either and Sapphire has also immortalized itself as a company. Well, the card is also a bit cheaper, so the LED fireworks are missing this time. I did not miss it.

If you turn the 1416 gram (medium) heavy card backwards, you will see a massive backplate like on the XTX, but without any lightning. Color imprints will have to do.  We end the navel-gazing of the Sapphire RX 7900XT Pulse 20 GB with the two familiar DisplayPort 2.1 ports, an HDMI 2.1 jack, and a true USB Type-C port.

Overview of RDNA3 cards – Technical data

The RDNA3 cards are quite different and not only on the outside. Sapphire’s card is similar to the reference and is more of a real reason card. Inflated OC candidates are hardly faster in total, just significantly thirstier. We will see later that the concept has also worked.

Once again the tabular comparison:

 

Test setup

By popular demand, I am again relying on a closed system, which offers a truly practical basis in the form of a PC specially assembled for igor’sLAB by MIFCOM(exemplary product link, not an affiliate). The case used is really good, has enough internal volume and also an excellent airflow. The used AiO compact water cooling in the form of Be Quiet’s Silen Loop II fits visually to the overall concept and the RGB accents of RAM and motherboard can either be set to plain white or turned off completely in case of doubt. When things get too colorful again.

The PC was assembled nice and neat by MIFCOM (I’m always like that with the cables) and can be purchased in this configuration (see below) exactly the same or modified at the dealer. It was simply important to me here to use a commercially available solution and not my extremely chilled lab hardware in the climate oasis. There is enough space between the side panel (glass) and the graphics card and the storage space of the XL case was not even close to being used. Thus, even all other RTX 4080 (and RTX 4090) with the unspeakable adapter still have enough room to breathe. This should therefore fit, since the Radeon cards do not have a problem with sprawling bending radii. I also only need two fans in the front.

However, the measurement of the detailed power consumption and other, more in-depth things is done in the lab on two tracks using high-resolution oscilloscope technology (there are also various follow-ups!) and the self-created, MCU-based measurement setup for motherboards and graphics cards (pictures below) or NVIDIA’s PCAT. For this, of course, I use a redundant system, with the same components, because such measurements in the housing are rather difficult.

The audio measurements are done outside in my Chamber (room within a room).

I have also summarized the individual components of the test system in a table: